Tamms employees say it would be a bad idea to close prison

Illinois Governor Pat Quinn announced plans to close Tamms Correctional Center, but prison guards at the super-max facility say that would make all other prisons in the state less safe.

"No prison stands on its own," said Corrections Lt. Toby Oliver, an employee of Tamms and president of the local AFSCME Union. "It's a system and this is one level we can use to ensure safety at all other facilities."

Lt. Oliver says Tamms is what keeps inmates in other prisons in line. It's reserved for the worst of the worst and he says the desire not to go there acts as a sort of deterrent for violence in other state prisons.

"Before Tamms opened, we didn't have that safety valve," said Oliver.

And Oliver says he knows how violent prisons were. He started his career in Joliet at Stateville Correctional Center where he was attacked by an inmate and stabbed four times in the leg.

"It was a metal trash can lid handle converted into a shank," said Oliver.

He says it was terrifying to go back to work in that maximum security prison knowing it could happen again.

"I'd throw up in the parking lot before work because my nerves were shot," said Oliver. "And I was going back into the environment where I was viciously attacked. It was scary."

But when Tamms opened, there were consequences when inmates attacked. If they were deemed too dangerous to stay in maximum security prison, they were taken to Tamms where they were never allowed to be in close contact with other inmates.

"The staff assaults, the inmate assaults, we have a better system since Tamms opened," said Oliver. "Tamms works."

Authorities say a missing Pennsylvania teenager and a 45-year-old man who frequently signed her out of school without her parents' permission have been located in Mexico, and the man has been arrested.

Authorities say a missing Pennsylvania teenager and a 45-year-old man who frequently signed her out of school without her parents' permission have been located in Mexico, and the man has been arrested.

(AP Photo/Jennifer Kay). Six crosses are placed at a makeshift memorial on the Florida International University campus in Miami on Saturday, March 17, 2018, near the scene of a pedestrian bridge collapse that killed at least six people on March 15.

A matter of seconds between those who would live and those who would die as Florida pedestrian bridge topples down highway bustling with passing vehicles.

A matter of seconds between those who would live and those who would die as Florida pedestrian bridge topples down highway bustling with passing vehicles.

(Nick Wagner/Austin American-Statesman via AP). FBI agents work the scene of an explosion in Austin, Texas, Sunday, March 18, 2018. At least a few people were injured in another explosion in Texas' capital late Sunday, after three package bombs detonat...

Officials reported that an explosion in southwest Austin injured two men in their 20s who were hospitalized with injuries that didn't appear to be life-threatening.

Officials reported that an explosion in southwest Austin injured two men in their 20s who were hospitalized with injuries that didn't appear to be life-threatening.

(Joe Ahlquist/The Rochester Post-Bulletin via AP). Emergency personnel respond to the scene of a fatal stabbing Saturday, March 17, 2018, at the Salvation Army Castleview Residence in downtown Rochester, Minn. Police have arrested a man in the multiple...

Police have arrested a man in the fatal stabbing of two men at a Salvation Army apartment building in downtown Rochester, Minnesota.

Police have arrested a man in the fatal stabbing of two men at a Salvation Army apartment building in downtown Rochester, Minnesota.

Conway parents were arrested for unlawful neglect of a child after their baby was allegedly thrown from his car seat, according to a police report from Horry County Police. 20-year-old Juliana Biggerstaff and 22-year-old Jacob Lowman were arrested on Thursday after a complainant called police. Officers responded to a residence on Woodwinds Drive in Conway on March 14. Upon arrival, officers located a baby boy with a “visible injury to the top of his h...

Conway parents were arrested for unlawful neglect of a child after their baby was allegedly thrown from his car seat, according to a police report from Horry County Police. 20-year-old Juliana Biggerstaff and 22-year-old Jacob Lowman were arrested on Thursday after a complainant called police. Officers responded to a residence on Woodwinds Drive in Conway on March 14. Upon arrival, officers located a baby boy with a “visible injury to the top of his h...